Landmark estate is up for sale with £10m price tag

Yarnton Manor is a Grade II* listed Jacobean property, which is owned by the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies.

Set in almost 30 acres in Yarnton, the main building dates back to Norman times and was remodelled in 1611 by Sir Thomas Spencer to create one of the largest houses in the country at the time.

During the 1930s, when the property belonged to George Alfred Kolkhorst, a reader in Spanish at Oxford University, poet John Betjeman was a frequent guest.

In 1975 it became home to the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies, which is set to move to the Oxford University-owned Clarendon Institute, in Walton Street, Jericho.

Mark Charter, head of agent Carter Jonas’s Oxford office, who is handling the sale, said: “Yarnton Manor is of great historical significance to the county and its sale offers a rare opportunity. Given the estate’s proximity to the university, I anticipate it will appeal to another academic institution, who will buy it as a whole, or to a private buyer who is looking for an exceptional private residence in glorious Oxfordshire.”

A planning application has been submitted to convert the manor to residential use, creating an eight-bedroom house with four reception rooms and a breakfast/dining room.

Also included in the sale are three further lots, including a six-bedroom vicarage, student accommodation, cottages and barns.

No-one was available for comment from the Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies. But in a statement it said: “The move from its premises in Yarnton will enable the centre further to integrate into the university the centre’s teaching and research and will provide a new base in the city centre for the centre’s outreach to a wider public.

“The move will greatly benefit the operation of the international research groups convened by the centre under the aegis of the Oxford Seminars in Advanced Jewish Studies, providing these researchers with office space closer both to those teaching in Jewish studies and related fields in the university and to the resources of the Bodleian Library.”